Advice from the Trenches: Words Grads Should Live By

As serendipity would have it, Jeremiah Owyang of Forrester Research posted a very interesting blog today. It was about what criteria people look for when hiring/looking for social media services.

I posted a response to his post in hopes to get deeper insight into a more general question which was:

Jeremiah:

More of a question than a comment — your focus here is on those with experience to help an organization with their “social media” efforts. I’m wondering what type of skills you might expect from graduating college seniors when it comes to social media and marketing?

As a college prof who teaches Internet-based Marketing I’ve been working hard to ensure my students are grounded in Marketing best practices and that they are up to date on the latest tools (as much as a 15 week class can get them there).

So, if a college grad came to you fresh out of college with a marketing degree what would you want to see on their resume or LinkedIn account?

Leave it to the social media community to provide me with timely, relevant advice for my students and other grads interested in Communications, Marketing and PR. Here are some excerpts that were posted in the comment section as well as some advice that came to me via email. (To read the full discussion/comments go to the original post: http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2009/04/08/social-media-services/)

1. jeremiah_owyang: A good question. When it comes to the freshly minted graduates, I personally would focus on: 1) Eagerness and willingness to learn, then followed by 2) related accomplishments in the field they are pursuing. Here’s where internships, school projects, and volunteer work come into play, giving graduates related experience as they enter the workforce. Specifically, if they were going to head into the social media field or marketing in general, they should be able to demonstrate their abilities around their own personal brand. What and how they use the tools, in addition to what they say will be telling.
   
2. Rick Murray : The first thing we look for at Edelman is raw intellect. We want people who can think; we can teach them PR. Second, is a real passion for learning; this is often articulated as a love of news, and/or an awareness of what’s new and emerging in society, politics, technology, etc. Third, is how well they communicate and present themselves.
   Fourth, is like-ability and perceived cultural fit. Increasingly however, the prelude to all of these is a quick scan of the search engines to see how findable they are, and to what extent are they using social media / networking to express themselves. It’s not that we don’t hire people who aren’t knowledgable about and avid users of social media; we most certainly do. That said, a candidate’s value to us — especially those at entry level — is dramatically enhanced if they are.
   
3. melissa cheater ...when in the process of hiring an entry level social media position - we definitely went the way of recent grads from two great local programs - and got nothing in the way of hands on experience. We ended up hiring a media masters student but I think the criteria above from Rick would have found us someone who could hit the ground running .. It’s true that you can teach pr and marketing, so it is important to focus on initiative, innovation, passion and problem solving/ability to survive...
   
4. Joseph Kingsbury I’d also echo Rick Murray’s point about raw intellect. To use a clumsy sports analogy, look for people that can run fast, hit hard and who have non-stop motors; you can teach them the playbook.
   
5. Elyse Tager We are a media strategy, planning and buying agency and have hired several newly minted grads in the past - some successful, some not so. Social media knowledge has given these people a whole new skill set to leverage in the job search. However, I would (and will in future hires) look first for all those traits that Rick Murray mentions above. I would also add that the importance of good communication skills and a strong sense of professionalism is even more important in the social media realm, since all communications are “out there”. One last thought - Hiring is an unnatural act at best and intuition plays a key part.
   
6. Scott Hammond (via email): We look for two things above all others: social media aptitude and communication skills. By social media aptitude I mean user aptitude of traditional social media channels in the Myspace/Facebook/Twitter-verse. We don't really care if someone can quote HTML code from memory, or if they have designed multiple sites, because the tech skills we use are simple and easily taught. We do care that someone is an active participant in social media, plugged in to multiple channels, and a positive contributor in those spaces. One of our interview "trip questions" is asking someone what their internet usage habits are. The correct answer should go something like, "I wake up, check e-mails and messages on Myspace, Facebook, and Twitter, brush my teeth and shower.....I put on my pj's and check messages on Myspace Facebook and Twitter one last time before going to sleep." By communications skills I mean reading comprehension and composition specifically. We like people who have read and written A LOT in the past, and English and History majors always get a careful look. This is key because reading messages and responding intelligently to them is either the job itself, or the skill set required to execute new plans.

So there you have it. Advice from the trenches. Many thanks to @jowyang, @rickmurray, @mmbc, @jkingsbury, @ElyseTager and @scotty_nola for their advice.

Anyone else have advice for graduating students?